FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT EC - PAGE 5

The United States and the European Community, concluding a heated round of negotiations in Brussels and Washington, said Friday they reached an agreement to limit Common Market steel exports to 5.5 percent of the U.S. market. The agreement, which extends through September, 1989, comes only a day after steel import figures released by the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) in Washington showed steel imports from the Common Market had surged nearly 50 percent in September from August levels.

Is the United States being holier-than-thou when it complains about trade discrimination in Europe? Clinton administration officials have been engaging in rhetoric that appears to suggest they think the U.S. maintains a completely open market while Europe throws up protectionist barriers to American firms. European business and government leaders argue that this is a distortion of reality. "If both the U.S. and Europe had to go to confession, the priest would hear the same series of sins being confessed," said Zygmunt Tyskiewicz, secretary general of the European Employers Federation.

BP confident: Oil giant BP Amoco PLC said it expected to complete the acquisition of U.S. rival Atlantic Richfield later this year despite an in-depth inquiry announced Thursday by the European Commission. BP Amoco, which unveiled the planned $26.8 billion Arco purchase in April, said it did not believe the commission's move would affect its timetable, but it would not specify exactly when it expected to close the deal. The EC has launched a full-scale investigation into the bigger merger between Exxon Corp.

Meanwhile: The U.S. and the European Community tied up the last details of a key farm trade deal, opening the way for a final agreement in Geneva on talks to revitalize world commerce into the 21st Century. Top U.S. technical farm negotiator Joe O`Mara and EC counterpart Guy Legras agreed on the small print of a trade deal struck 13 days ago against strong French opposition. The United States was due to impose punitive duties Saturday on $300 million worth of food and wine imports from the community.

Getting tough: The Clinton administration said Thursday it will impose trade sanctions against the 12-nation European Community in a dispute involving government contracts for telecommunications equipment. The administration said it would bar European companies from bidding for certain federal contracts. Although the sanctions, effective Friday, would cover approximately $20 million in annual contracts, a relatively minor amount, they prompted an immediate angry response. Sir Leon Brittan, the EC's top trade negotiator, said he greatly regretted the American action, calling it "neither justified, wise nor necessary."

The women's basketball team dropped two games in the Hawaii Paradise Classic. A 68-60 loss to Loyola Marymount and 73-64 setback against Oregon marked the first time since 1986-87 that NIU opened a season 0-2. Senior guard E.C. Hill was named to the all-tournament team. After struggling against Loyola Marymount-Hill was 3 of 15 from the field and the team was 19 of 72-she bounced back with a 28-point performance against Oregon. The Huskies play host to No. 13 Southern Cal in Cheryl Miller's USC coaching debut at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Croatian police exchanged gunfire with Yugoslav army soldiers at Zagreb's airport on Saturday, and holdout Serbia agreed to a European Community peace proposal hours before the EC deadline for acceptance took effect. Serb militias and the Serbian-dominated army continued their attacks on the beseiged eastern Croatian city of Vukovar Saturday, as fighting flared in several other towns across Croatia. Seven people were reported killed in Vukovar and at least 20 wounded. And in their first clash in the Croatian capital of Zagreb, army soldiers and Croatian police fired on one another after Yugoslav military planes forced down two airliners, from Romania and Uganda, to search for suspected arms.

The European Commission announced Thursday that it has approved the $2.2 billion acquisition of EMI Music Publishing by an investor consortium led by Sony/ATV. To get approval for the deal from the EC, the buyer promised to sell the publishing rights to Virgin's European, U.K. and U.S. catalogs, as well as the works of a dozen artists, including Ozzy Osbourne, Robbie Williams and Ben Harper. Last month, reports said the buyers also planned to sell classical, Christian and schlager music catalogs to pacify regulators (Daily Variety, March 28)

In the rush towards European unity, nit-picking Brussels-based "Eurocrats"-European Community bureaucrats-are digging themselves deeper into piles of pig manure. Dutch Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers brought the issue to a head this time, demanding that the EC allow the Dutch to do something about the mounting environmental problems posed by the Netherlands` growing piles of manure. So far the Eurocrats are refusing to budge, even as the mountains of manure grow. At issue are some 80 million tons of manure produced yearly in the Netherlands` efficient, high-tech farms.

Stefan Edberg, the world's top-ranked tennis player, has resumed training after a long injury break and hopes to make his comeback in the EC tournament Monday. "I`m feeling all right now, but I need a few more days of hard training before determining if I`m ready to play," Edberg told the Swedish news agency. "I`m not going to take any risks. Maybe it's a bit too early to enter the (EC) tournament, but I`ll be ready for the Grand Slam Cup for sure." The $6 million Grand Slam Cup, a non-ATP Tour event organized by the International Tennis Federation, starts Dec. 11 in Munich, Germany.